China's fiscal revenue soared almost 20 percent in 2005 to hit a record 3.16 trillion yuan (395 billion U.S. dollars), Finance Minister Jin Renqing said on June 27.

The figure was achieved by the implementation of a prudent fiscal policy since 2005 that enabled stable and rapid economic growth and more forceful revenue collection by finance, taxation and customs departments.

The 3,393 billion-yuan (424.1 billion U.S. dollars) national fiscal expenditure, up 19.1 percent over the previous year, outnumbered revenue by 228 billion yuan (28.5 billion dollars), Jin said when delivering a report to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the legislature.

The central treasury pocketed 1,726 billion yuan (215.75 billion dollars), the two largest sources being value-added tax (VAT) revenue of 793.1 billion yuan (99.1 billion dollars) and consumer tax, VAT and tariff on imports totaling 527.7 billion yuan (65.9 billion dollars).

Some 702.2 billion yuan (87.8 billion dollars) of state bonds were issued by the central treasury to claim 692.2 billion yuan (86.5 billion dollars) in revenue for the state coffers, nearly 300 billion yuan of which was used to offset the budget deficit, he said.

About 35.3 billion yuan (4.4 billion dollars) of the 163.7 billion yuan (20.4 billion dollars) by the central treasury was used for tax rebates to local treasuries, general transfer payment, transfer payment for minority-concentrated regions, educational and scientific undertakings, and the rest went to paying money overdue to avert financial risks.

Investment in farming increased to $37 bln

China's central treasury allocated 297.5 billion yuan (37.2 billion U.S. dollars) to facilitate farming and rural development and raise farmers' income last year, up 13.3 percent from 2004, said Finance Minister Jin Renqing on Tuesday.

Of the investment, 66.2 billion yuan (8.3 billion U.S. dollars) was transfer payment to support the rural taxation reform, cutting 22 billion yuan (2.8 billion dollars) in agricultural tax.

The central and local budgets paid 13.2 billion yuan (1.7 billion U.S. dollars) in subsidies to 642 million farmers cultivating grain in 30 provinces and autonomous regions across the country, said Jin when reporting to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress.

Some 98.9 billion yuan (12.3 billion U.S. dollars) from the state coffers was used to improve rural infrastructure and another 2.7 billion yuan (33.8 million U.S. dollars) on free textbooks to 34 million poor rural students in underdeveloped central and western regions.

Another 6.9 billion yuan (86.3 million dollars) went to compulsory education, dilapidated rural schools, education in rural primary and secondary schools and rural labor force training.